Information on the Primary Global Political-Economic Regions

Doctor of Sciences in Sociology, Ph.D. in Economics & Management, Master of Arts in Political Economy, author of 12 books and more than 400 articles – specially for the NEWSSKY.COM.UA Journal

On the 160 States and 40 Primary Political-Economic Regions of the World under My Global Ranking. Part II: Information on the Primary Global Political-Economic Regions

Dear Readers! In the first part of my international political economy series’ article the 2016 global rankings of countries on their population, EIU Democracy Index (DI), developed by me Economic Performance (EPI) and Political Economy Achievements (IPEA) Indexes have been presented.

On this political map 196 countries of the world are presented.

All 160 really existing and functioning states (countries) of the world with 0.8 million or more 2016 and 2017 population have been included in my rating table. I have stressed that in 2016 almost all from 26 countries of the highest level of political economy achievements group attained IPEA growth, and often very substantial. It was their distinctive feature: almost 89% of the highest group countries demonstrated IPEA growth, comparing to 55% in the 2nd group (31 states with high level of political economy achievements), 59% in the 3rd group (36 states with satisfactory level of political economy achievements) and only about 46% in the most numerous (67 states) group of societies with low level of political economy achievements. Also 11 of the highest group countries (more than 42%!) attained the IPEA growth of +.10 or more, like only 12 (9%...) from the rest of 134 states.

Also the distribution of 160 countries from my ratings on the base of belonging to enlarged (secondary) regions of the world by the 2016 IPEA groups is presented there. It is useful to emphasize again that even the “secondary” or “enlarged” regions I treat as real communities of societies, with strong enough mutual influence of constituting countries, their governments and Peoples in political, economic and spiritual spheres.

Let me stress further the methodological moment of crucial importance. Because each region of the world is formed as common social space integrated to some degree, I count up regional Democracy and Economic Performance Indexes as weighted arithmetic averages. Their numerator is the sum of products of numbers: each country index value is multiplied by its population and the results are added up. Their denominator is the population of this region. That is why I specify my regional DI as theGlobal one.

Table 3

PRIMARY REGIONS OF THE WORLD 2016 RANKING BY THE IPEA

(The ratings embrace 167countries with the 2016population of 0.3million and more for which the Democracy Index was counted up; after the political-economic regions’ names their countries are listed in alphabetical order,after the population data, Democracy and Economic Performance Indexes values – places of a region in the population, DI and EPI 2016 global ratings, after the Index of Political Economy Achievements – place of a region in the IPEA 2015 global rating are shown in brackets)

REGIONS

2016 Population (thousands)

2016 Democracy Global Regional Index

2016 Economic Performance Index

2016 Index of Political Economy Achievements

1. Scandinavia (Denmark; Finland; Iceland; Norway; Sweden)

26,696 (34)

9.38 (01)

5.15 (02)

7.27 (01)

2. United States (country-region)

323,128 (06)

7.98 (08)

5.87 (01)

6.93 (02)

3. Central Europe – western part (Austria; Germany; Switzerland)

98,787 (17)

8.65 (04)

5.10 (03)

6.88 (03)

4. Developed Oceania (Australia; New Zealand)

28,820 (32)

9.05 (03)

4.46 (04)

6.76 (05)

5. Canada (country-region)

36,286 (31)

9.15 (02)

4.34 (06)

6.75 (04)

6. British Isles (Ireland; United Kingdom)

70,410 (24)

8.41 (05)

4.31 (07)

6.36 (06)

7. Mainland Western Europe (Belgium; France; Luxembourg; Netherlands)

95,845 (18)

8.06 (07)

4.43 (05)

6.25 (07)

8. Developed East Asia (Japan; Republic of Korea; Taiwan, the Province of China)

201,781 (11)

7.95 (09)

4.16 (08)

6.06 (08)

9. Southwestern Europe (Italy; Malta; Portugal; Spain)

117,807 (16)

8.10 (06)

3.69 (10)

5.90 (09)

10. Developed Eastern Mediterranean states (Cyprus – area controlled by the government of Cyprus; Greece; Israel)

Sourcesofthe data for the EPI and IPEA count: publications of the EconomistIntelligenceUnit (Democracy Index) and WorldBank (population & GNI – or GDP – (PPP) per capita).

But in the case of “enlarged” regions their inner stratification differences are very (or even too) substantial. For this reason I use the analyses of situation with the primary political-economic regions of the world as the basic mode of my international political economy research. These primary regions are absolutely self-sufficient global actors of decisive significance. At the same time they function as the structural elements of enlarged regions. In the case of developed Eastern Mediterranean states this element of global system is of interregional nature from the secondary regions’ viewpoint because of Europe (Cyprus and Greece) and North Africa & Middle East (Israel) countries presence in it.

In the previous academic article of my series in English I have singled out 30 primary political-economic regions of the world embracing 160 countries. But this division does not provide researchers with statistical results precise enough in many cases of regional groupings of societies, first of all – ones with relatively high level of political economy achievements, and is somewhat “discriminatory” mainly in research attitude to the groups of countries with the highest level of political economy achievements. That is why I have begun to use the division onto 40 primary political-economic regions of the world embracing 167 countries (please see Table 3).

Let me remind you: in 2015 and 2016 the DI has been counted up not only for 160 countries of my basic rankings but also for six democratic “micro-states” with population from 0.3 to 0.6 million – Cabo Verde, Iceland, Luxembourg, Malta, Montenegro, Suriname – and Chinese statehood has been represented by Hong Kong (not only by China and Taiwan). Under new framework these seven societies become substantially important for their primary regions’ aggregate political and economic results, and for this reason they are included directly to my research scheme.

As dear Readers remember, under my Index of Political Economy Achievements ranking I have picked up four groups of states with the scores of 5.50–10, 4–5.49, 3–3.99 and below 3 correspondingly. Let us compare the distribution of 160 countries and their per cent shares between the IPEA groups (please see below in brackets) with the 40 primary political-economic regions including 167 societies one (please see before the brackets):

1. Primary regions with the highest level of political economy achievements – 9, or 22.5% (26, or 16.3%)

2. Primary regions with high level of political economy achievements – 11, or 27.5% (31, or 19.4%)